A real pick and mix in the talent show of politics

Before Australians mark their federal ballot papers later this year, sending a new Parliament to Canberra for another three years, we can make some predictions with certainty about their choices.

The MPs they elect will largely be former lawyers, business people, political staffers and union officials. They will most likely be men, born in Australia and university-educated.

But will they be good for the job?

There are many reasons sensible and capable people would run screaming if offered a job in politics. Public scrutiny of private lives would be foremost among them, argues former Labor leader
Mark Latham
.

Before he agrees to speak to me, Latham wants to know if I am related to Damien Murphy, a journalist for The Sydney Morning Herald who once published an article about his former girlfriends. I’m not.

“In 2004 Murphy wrote an expose of my sex life," Latham says. “You hope in some parts of your life, people can respect the normal boundaries of privacy."

Latham regards invasion of privacy as far more relevant than concerns about pay. “If you are a talented business person earning good money, happy family life, making a contribution to your company, you look at all this other rubbish and think, ‘Geez, why would I go do that? Why would I change a happy, successful life for the pitfalls of [controversial cartoonist] Larry Pickering, [or] Damien Murphy?’

“What you tend to get are battle-hardened experienced political apparatchiks, staffers, who know all of this stuff, and for whatever reason don’t seem to mind it all that much and willingly go in."

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Latham, who wrote a policy book, Civilising Global Capital: New Thinking for Australian Labor, before he became Labor leader, and The Latham Diaries afterwards, argues that these warriors tend to be more interested in the rough and tumble than big ideas.

“You can count on one hand the number of people in the federal Parliament who talk about issues that might be relevant 10 or 20 years from now. Going back to when I was there, in the late ’90s, there were probably a couple of dozen people writing policy articles, pamphlets, books, agitating about long-term thinking," Latham says.

Assuming that is true, and not just tinted by nostalgia, does it matter?

Should politicians be expected to be deep thinkers as well as effective managers? Philosophers, but also in touch with the common people?

Several high-profile politicians have pushed the view that, in any case, governments are driven by just a few. Howard government workplace relations minister
Peter Reith
made a public statement in 2012 which implied that most MPs were deadweight in policy. “You just need seven or eight good people at the federal level," he said.

Meanwhile our federation is blessed with professional public servants, think tanks are proliferating and expert advisers are to hand. So how important is it for houses of Parliament be filled with our best and brightest thinkers?

Strong backbenchers are a foundation stone on which good government is built, says former Victorian premier
Jeff Kennett
. He says you need six to eight top ministers running a state, eight to 10 running the country. But he does not discount the value of the rest.

“They are all good, they have all got experiences," he says. “Not everyone is going to be of the same skill level. But you need a good bunch of people who are technically very correct, who are creative, who can, with the leader of the day, the premier, deliver the leadership to the party, to the bureaucracy and to the community."

Otherwise, says Latham, a shallow talent pool shows through. “You get a shallow government. You get a heavy reliance on a handful of people which concentrates power, concentrates influence, and I’m not too sure that’s very healthy for a political party, the Parliament, or our democracy," he says.

“One of the problems for the current Labor government is, if they wanted to change leaders, who do you turn to, where’s the talent pool?"

The federal Labor government sent a clear signal about its talent pool in March last year, when it selected former NSW premier
Bob Carr
as Foreign Minister. Carr’s successful move from state politics via consultancy work to the Senate and federal ministerial status was rare.

Heading the other way is also rare, and can also be a smart career choice.
John Brumby
was elected three times as federal member for Bendigo without portfolio responsibilities. When he switched to the state game, he rose quickly to be party leader, although it was
Steve Bracks
who took the party to power in 1999. But Brumby later became premier of Victoria in 2007.

It is widely conceded that whatever the failings of federal Parliament, it attracts a better quality MP than the state houses. In a recent opinion piece in the Fairfax press that called for the abolition of state governments, academic Allan Patience said the public regarded state parliaments as “sheltered workshops for the politically disabled".

Reith, unlike Kennett, reckons state governments need just two or three good ministers, and Carr has argued they needn’t even be full-time.

“I think we might as well accept it and contract the size of state governments and accept that state MPs can do their function in another 20 years on a part-time basis and that you can have as few as five ministers running states," Carr said in 2008.

State MPs base their pay on federal MPs’ remuneration, which suggests more pay alone is not the answer to getting better MPs. In any case, MPs are already reasonably well rewarded, and can anticipate superannuation if re-elected.

Federal backbencher pay was raised from $141,000 in 2012 to $191,000 – equal to 2.5 times average full-time adult earnings. The Prime Minister, who also gets two houses, earns $495,000.

But salary is only a fraction of the story.

Perks have been sliced but are still a major part of politicians’ compensation. Cars, accompanied travel and daily expense allowances cost taxpayers, but do they help attract a better quality of MP?

Whether they make good representatives or not, a temptation for political parties is to rally behind celebrity candidates.

Not only are celebrities accustomed to the glare of media scrutiny, but their selection feeds on a well-known cognitive bias. We tend to assume people capable in one field will excel in another. Opposition communications spokesman
Malcolm Turnbull
and School Education Minister
Peter Garrett
both rose high in their parties before suffering reversals. Turnbull was bumped out as leader, Garrett lost his post as minister for environment.

Name recognition is no guarantee of longevity. The division of Bennelong is on its second celebrity candidate after former ABC journalist
Maxine McKew
lost the seat she took from
John Howard
to tennis great
John Alexander
.

Latham says celebrities such as Alexander suffer from the high expectations and don’t always have the right skill set.

“He still seems more interested in tennis than politics. He talks about the paucity of land for tennis courts. Maybe that’s just what he gets in the media with. He might be a great sports minister one day, we’ll have to wait and see. The old JA . . . I wish he’d go back to tennis commentary. I miss him in January."